The reason for all the noise became clearer as I crept closer. While the rest of the ghouls shouted encouragement, a group of four were throwing themselves against Isidora’s wards. A couple were hacking at low-hanging tree branches with axes while the other two had scrambled up the tree to try to disrupt the fetishes hanging there. All the while they howled in pain and fury as the wards assaulted their minds.
As I watched, one ghoul scurried up the tree, illuminated by a flashlight beam. Reaching out, he snatched a bone fetish dangling from a branch. As soon as his fingers closed around it he screeched with agony, his back going rigid. He toppled out of the tree, hitting the spongy ground below with a muted thud. A couple of his buddies rushed over to check he was okay. Shaking his head, he sat back up and crushed the fetish in his hand. After a moment’s rest his friends helped him to his feet and he went for the tree again.
It wasn’t exactly a surgical strike, but it was working. Isidora’s wards were enough to see off any animals or wandering troublemakers, but these ghouls were determined. It wouldn’t be long until they broke through by sheer brute force.
I crouched down in the brush, weathered the rain, and considered my options. If I wanted them gone by any means necessary, that wouldn’t be a problem. I had my revolver in my pocket, for starters. A few warning shots would probably scare them off. And if that didn’t work, well, ghouls weren’t exactly bulletproof.
I had a few other tricks up my sleeve as well. Like the vial of witch’s fire in my pocket. Witch’s fire burned even in the rain. That would scatter them. Probably hurt them enough that they’d think twice about coming back tonight.
I struck both ideas off the list. No one was going to die tonight. Not if I could help it. These ghouls were a real bunch of assholes, but they had a good reason to be worked up. They believed Isidora had killed Habi. I had to convince them she hadn’t. Or at least that they shouldn’t go after her until we had more information. And I had to do that without fanning the flames any further.
Hell, where was Early when you needed him?
“Enough!” I yelled, my voice booming out of the darkness. Ghouls yelled in surprise and huddled together. Flashlight beams darted about in search of me.
I strode forward. “You should not have come here. You are meddling with things you don’t understand.”
A flashlight beam found me, and one of the ghouls yelped. In an instant, all the other flashlights had picked me out as well. The lights dazzled me, but I kept moving forward, refusing to squint or shield my eyes.
“There are dangerous things in these woods,” I said. “More dangerous than a pack of worked-up little ghouls. Leave. Return to your own territory.”
“You can’t scare us, cunning man,” came a voice from the crowd.
Daud. Of course. I could make out the little prick now, near the middle of the pack. He was holding a tire iron in both hands.
“Looks like I’m doing a pretty good job,” I said, gesturing to the ghouls around him. “And they should be scared. You keep this up, you’ll all end up dead.”
I walked up to the edge of the wardnet. I could see the ghouls more clearly now. Most of them had been at the abandoned car where Habi was found, but it looked like Daud had rounded up a couple of other friends as well.
“You want to talk to us about fear?” Daud pointed his tire iron at me. “Look at you, cowering behind the witch’s magic. Are you working with her, cunning man?” He smiled a thin smile. “Or are you just her pet?”
“The witch didn’t kill Habi,” I said.
The smile slipped from his face. “Liar!” he roared. “You’re working with her! I saw you pawing over Habi’s body, reading his journal.” The smile returned. “But you didn’t find what you were looking for, did you?”
I stared at Daud for a second, my mind whirring. He just sneered triumphantly. I leaned forward.
“It was you, wasn’t it?” I hissed. “You tore the pages out of his journal.”
“I wasn’t going to let Habi’s murderers get their hands on those pages.”
“If I’d killed him, I would’ve taken the journal with me!” Frustration boiled over. I strode forward, thrusting my hand out. “Give me those pages, Daud. If there’s something in there that points to his murderer, I need to know. More people are going to die if we don’t stop whatever did this.”
“That’s why we’re here,” Daud said. He looked around at his friends. “Take out the cunning man. Then we deal with the witch.”
There was still fear in the ghouls’ eyes, but it had galvanized. They began to fan out. And then I realized my mistake.
I’d walked through the wardnet.
The witch’s wards were one-directional. They kept things out, not in. And I’d been too caught up in Daud’s words to realize I’d crossed the threshold.
Now my back was against a figurative but no less impenetrable wall. The ghouls surrounded me and raised their weapons.
“Kill him!” Daud barked.
12
The ghouls charged.
I reached into my pocket and closed my hand around a thin porcelain jar. Clenching my teeth, I crushed the jar in my fist.
As the bottle shattered, it let loose a high-pitched screech loud enough to rattle my teeth. The sound ripped through the woods, obliterating the patter of rain. Ghouls cried out around me, clutching at their ears. One dropped his flashlight and it splattered in the mud, its beam illuminating our feet.
Before the sound began to fade I hurled myself forward, raising my truncheon. One ghoul, a tall guy with lanky black hair, shook off his surprise quicker than the others. Maybe he was hard-of-hearing. He saw me coming and tried to bring his crowbar up.
I got in close and drove my truncheon into his stomach, checking the blow at the last moment. He went down gasping for breath, but hopefully without any serious injury. For some reason I was still clinging to the insane hope I could get out of this without anyone dying.
I had to try, though. Early was right—this town was vulnerable at the moment. I couldn’t afford to inflame tensions with the larger ghoul community.
Any more than I already had, I mean.
I slammed my elbow into another ghoul’s nose and charged forward. My eyes were fixed on one ghoul in particular. Daud. He was leading this little witch hunt. And he knew something about Habi’s death. I had to bring him down. If he fell, the others would give up the fight.
I hoped.
I tore a handful of charmed sheep knuckles from my pocket and threw them in the faces of a pair of ghouls to my left. Where they hit skin, they left red, burning marks that sent the ghouls reeling backward, screaming. Another little parlor trick. Anything to buy me a few seconds, bring me a few feet closer to Daud.
It wasn’t enough.
As I threw myself toward Daud’s stunned, eminently punchable face, I felt something hard slam into my back. Lightning arced up my spine. I stumbled, trying to turn toward my attacker.
The ghoul swung again, the length of rebar catching me between the shoulder blades. It was like getting hit with a sledgehammer. Ghouls are wiry, but they pack a hell of a punch.
I fell to my hands and knees, mud splattering across my sleeves. Pain tore at my bones. I gasped for breath.
The other ghouls were closing in now as well. I felt something hit my calf, and another blow crashed into my hip. Daud strode forward, confident now. I snarled at him.
“Going to let your friends do the dirty work?”
He kicked me in the stomach. I coughed and groaned, but I stayed on my hands and knees, refusing to roll over.
“No more tricks, cunning man?” he said. It was hard to hear him over the roaring of the rain. It seemed to be getting louder, though the rain hammering on my back wasn’t growing stronger. My ears were ringing.
I didn’t answer Daud. I lifted my head and glared up at him, panting. He twirled the tire iron in his hands. I shivered.
“No? All right, then.” He smiled, licked his lips, and rai
sed the tire iron above his head in both hands.
My guts twisted up inside me. I closed my eyes. The only thought I could muster was a hope that Alice wouldn’t have to be the one to identify my body. When Daud was done with me, I wouldn’t be very pretty to look at.
Time seemed to stretch out. I felt mud between my clenched fingers. Felt the patter of rain on my back. Waited for the blow that would crack my skull open.
The ringing in my ears grew louder. So did the sound of the rain. No, not the rain. Something else. A rumbling, like an oncoming tsunami.
One of the ghouls cried out. I flinched, expecting to hear the whistling of a tire iron swinging toward my skull. Instead came more cries, and that growing rumbling. I opened my eyes.
The ghouls weren’t looking at me. Not anymore. A black wave was rolling across the forest floor toward us. A rippling of fur and muscle. Countless tails flicked back and forth like worms driven out of their holes by rain.
I realized suddenly that my ears weren’t ringing. The sound I could hear was a high-pitched chorus. The squealing of a thousand rats.
The rodents crashed against the ghouls like waves against rock. The first ghouls to be hit screamed and fell beneath the squealing, writhing mass of flesh and fur and teeth. I caught a glimpse of Daud backing away from me, his eyes wide in shock, the tire iron still in his hands.
Then the rats swept over us as well. I could feel their paws on my skin, dozens of them scurrying over me. Claws pinched at me. Tails whipped across my face. I didn’t want to open my mouth, so I screamed through gritted teeth, twisting and trying to shake them off. Any second I expected to feel hundreds of tiny teeth tearing at my flesh.
But the pain didn’t come. Within a few seconds, the rats had dived off me and rejoined the endless wave. While the ghouls who tried to flee fell beneath the tide, I knelt untouched, the rats parting around me. Trembling, I looked around.
There appeared to be no end to the rats. All I could see of Daud now was one arm flailing wildly, trying to beat the rats away. But new rats joined the pile faster than he could fight them off. His scream was drowned out by the incessant screeching of the rodents.
I never thought I’d feel sorry for the guy. But not even an asshole like Daud deserved this.
All the other ghouls were down as well. Some had tried to flee into the forest, but they hadn’t got far before they’d been caught by the ocean of rats. Limbs kicked and flailed hopelessly against the biting rodents. In the beam of a fallen flashlight I caught a brief glimpse of terrified ghoul eyes staring at me before they were swallowed up by fur.
A shadowed figure emerged from the dark of the woods. Hooded and cloaked, the figure strode forward, driving the rats in front of them. The figure came to a stop. One hand was at their side, clutching a familiar cage. Inside, a solitary rat skittered about.
The figure pulled back her hood. Isidora. The witch cast her eyes over her work and smiled in satisfaction.
“Stop this!” I yelled.
Her eyes met mine across the sea of squealing rodents. “Don’t I get a little gratitude for saving your life?” she called, her voice nearly drowned out by the sound of the rats.
“Thanks for the nightmare fuel. Now stop it. You’ve won.”
She cocked her head to the side as if considering my words. Her movements seemed unbearably slow against the sound of the ghouls’ screams.
“Maybe it’s better if they die,” she said. “Might keep others from coming back.”
“You kill them, you’ll have more than the ghouls to answer to.”
She frowned. Bringing the cage to her lips, she whispered something to the rat inside.
Acting as one, the rats began to disperse. Ghouls emerged from beneath the furry tide, gasping for air, their skin scratched and torn. One by one they picked themselves up, threw off the last of the rats, and fled into the woods.
All except Daud. The rats continued to swarm around him. And around me. A crowd of them circled me, close enough that I could feel their tails whipping at me as I knelt there. They separated me from both Daud and Isidora.
“What are you doing?” I said.
Isidora ignored me and walked over to Daud. The ghoul had gone still beneath the sea of rats. As Isidora approached, the rats pulled back, uncovering Daud’s face and upper torso. Dozens of scratches and gouges marred the ghoul’s face. I couldn’t tell if he was breathing.
The witch crouched at Daud’s side and started to paw at him. I couldn’t make out what she was doing at first. For a moment I thought she was giving him CPR or something. But then I saw her reach into one of Daud’s pockets.
“Hey!” I tried to stand, but pain stabbed at my hip where one of the ghouls had hit me. I collapsed back to one knee, the rats still swarming around me.
Isidora glanced over her shoulder at me. “You should get that looked at.”
“He better not be dead.”
She turned back to Daud and continued to riffle through his pockets. “I don’t know why you care. He didn’t seem concerned about your well-being.”
“He’s a dumb kid.”
“So are you.”
She brought something out of Daud’s pocket and bent over to peer at it in the darkness. I heard rain pattering on paper.
The pages from Habi’s journal. I tried to crawl forward, but the swarm of rats hissed and nipped at my fingers, forcing me back.
“Son of a—” I glared at Isidora. “I need those.”
She shuffled through the pages, studying them. “I can handle it from here, cunning man. You should go home. Rest. You’ve had a hard day.”
I grunted and reached into my pocket. “All right, to hell with this.”
I pulled out my revolver and leveled it at Isidora, cocking it with my thumb. The witch went still at the sound, then turned to face me.
“If you won’t let me kill the ghouls,” she said. “I doubt you’ll kill me.”
“I need those pages. Either we work together, or I take them from you.”
She cracked a smile. “I told you already, cunning man. I don’t need you.” She stood.
“All right,” I said. “Your choice.”
I snapped the revolver a few inches to the right and fired.
The gun kicked in my hand, the sound of the gunshot echoing through the woods. Isidora gasped. But the bullet didn’t hit her. It tore into the flimsy cage she held, smashing a hole in the side. With a squeal, the rat inside squirmed out and leapt to the ground, fleeing in terror.
The swarm of rats suddenly became a rout. They scattered in all directions, reverting to their natural instincts as they were cut off from whatever higher power commanded them.
Isidora shouted wordlessly, turning to chase the rat that’d escaped from her cage. She made it about two steps before I tackled her to the ground. My injured hip screamed in pain, but I gritted my teeth and held the witch tight as she squirmed in the mud.
“I saved your life!” she shouted.
“Appreciate it.” I got hold of her cloak and tried to roll her over. “Now hand over the pages.”
I grabbed for the journal pages scrunched in her hand. The damp paper began to tear.
“You’re ripping them!” Isidora snarled.
I just growled and held on.
The witch’s knee came up hard, slamming into my injured hip. A scream forced its way out of my throat. Dizzy pain washed over me. My grip on her cloak slipped.
Isidora rolled and tried to scramble away. She kicked out, catching me in the side of the head. Her coat slipped from between my fingers. I heard paper tearing.
And then she was free. She scrambled to her feet and didn’t stop. Without slowing, she ran past the skeletal tree that marked the boundary of her territory. No doubt she was carrying some counter-charm that would allow her to move through the wardnet unhindered.
I tried to stand and pursue her, but my hip gave out again and I collapsed back to the ground. Growling, I drew my revolver once more and aimed it in the
direction Isidora had fled. But she was already out of my sight.
“Shit.”
With a sigh, I flopped back down on my ass, letting the cold mud seep through my jeans. One by one my pains made themselves known. I’d taken a pretty good kicking. But not good enough to stop me.
I looked down at my hands and forced my fingers to unclench. Trapped in my fist were four torn pages. Well, four halves of pages, at least. Isidora must have gotten away with the other halves.
It looked like I’d gotten the bottom halves of each of the pages. With aching limbs I grabbed a fallen flashlight off the ground and wiped it off as best I could. I stuck it between my teeth and held up the pages to the light.
The top page was so splattered with rainwater that Habi’s writings were nothing more than a smeared mess. The next two weren’t much better. Habi’s handwriting was awful, and with the ink running all over the place it was close to unreadable. I didn’t want to ruin them any further before I got a chance to study them properly, so I carefully slipped the top pages into my inner coat pocket. But I paused as I was about to put away the last page.
Unlike the other pages, this one wasn’t covered with Habi’s handwriting. There were scrawled lines, arrows pointing, symbols sketched. It took me a few seconds to make any kind of sense of it. There were a couple of words scrawled on the page, but there was only one I could make out. Tomb?
It was a map. Just like the other maps that’d been in Habi’s journal. Maps documenting his scavenging trips. But this had to be the last map he’d sketched before his death. Maybe he’d found something he shouldn’t have. Maybe this map would lead to answers.
I stared at it hard, trying to make sense of it. But I only had half the page. The map was pointing to some place Habi had discovered while searching for dead flesh. Based on this scrap of paper, though, it could be anywhere.
I glared in the direction Isidora had fled. The other half of the map was clutched in her sweaty little rodent-stroking hand. I needed it. But I also knew it would be an idiotic idea to go after her now. First I’d have to get through the wardnet again, and she’d have plenty of time to clear out of the cabin before I arrived. And if she didn’t leave, then it’d be because she was waiting for me. Walking into an ambush with a bum leg and bruised ribs seemed like a bad idea.
Pay Dirt Page 12